LGBT People Of Color Still Struggling To Find Acceptance, Identity

Brooklyn Pride week is upon us, and with it comes renewed focus on issues facing LGBT people in today’s society. 

Marriage equality and HIV prevention remain top concerns across the borough’s gay community. However, according to Gay Men of African Descent, a Fort Greene-based organization, there is an even bigger, deeper issue affecting black gay men.

Tokes Osubu, executive director of GMAD, believes that the major conflict in the black gay community today is oppression from their own in the black community as a whole.

“Our primary identity is racial identity,” Osubu said, referring to many LGBT people of color’s dual identification with two, often conflicting, worlds.

According to Osubu, the goal for GMAD is to help black gay men find a place in both the black and gay community.

“How do you rise up against your own community?” Osubu said.

The answer, according to GMAD, is through education and understanding of the negative psychological effects that black gay men experience as a result of lack of community acceptance.  

According to Osubu, GMAD is the only black gay organization in New York City. Founded in 1986, the group maintains that acceptance of homosexuals in the black community must start with familial relationships.

“It goes beyond parades, marches, and the rainbow flag,” Osubu said.

Fostering a sense of acceptance within the black community is a key part of the fight against other problems plaguing many gay men of color, including drug abuse and unsafe sex, according Osubu.

Deputy executive director Vaughn Taylor-Akutagawa feels similarly.

“Marriage equality is not huge for working-class black men,” he said, adding that bullying, suicide, fair pay and education are the most important issues for GMAD.

In order to combat these problems, GMAD has created multiple programs, including the Charles Angel Leadership Academy, named after GMAD’s founder.

The academy educates young black gay men in leadership skills so that they can rise up and one day become the new leaders of the black gay community.

The program consists of 11 young men working to educate the public on black gay issues.

In addition to its leadership academy, GMAD has several programs, from youth services to a health and wellness clinic opened on Atlantic Avenue one month ago. 

GMAD is co-sponsoring and taking part in multiple Brooklyn Pride events this week, including Friday’s Pride Party at Club Langston and the Pride multicultural festival and night parade on Saturday.

For more information on this year’s Pride events, check out BrooklynPride.org or GMAD’s website, GMAD.org.